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15 Reasons He Likes You Insecure (And Wants To Keep You That Way)

When you first get into a relationship, you’re resting comfortably in what’s considered “the honeymoon” phase, where everything is completely romantic and you’re totally immersed in one another. Normally, in a completely functional relationship, when the honeymoon phase cools a tad, you’re still immersed with each other on a different, more intimate level – one that includes friendship and respect. However, there are some men out there who aren't so noble. If you happen to be a woman who suffers from insecurities, some men who have predatory-like mannerisms will feed off of these insecurities. Especially once the honeymoon phase has come to a close. There are some tell-tell signs he openly projects that should make you scratch your head a little. Here are 15 reasons why HE likes you insecure and prefers to keep you that way.

15It Masks His Own Insecurities

Let’s face it: it’s not just women who are insecure most of the time. While most men like to believe they beam with confidence, some men just do it in order to mask their own insecurities (and yes, this is the key to understanding “overcompensating” as well. I see you over there with that massive monster trunk). If he’s constantly attempting to keep YOU insecure, chances are he’s doing it to cover up his own insecurities. By keeping the focus on what you hate about YOU, he’s keeping the spotlight off what he hates about himself. It’s almost a constant Hector-Projector-like ping-pong game with him or a slight of hand trick: if you accidentally find yourself pointing out one of his faults, he’s quick to turn the tables back on you in order for him to stay safe in the dark.

14All The Focus Is On Him

And now we have the opposite of the “keep the focus off of me, for the love of crap” guy – the guy who likes to keep you insecure because then ALL the attention will be on him. And yes, this is mainly YOUR attention he covets. He’ll attempt to keep you insecure by highlighting what you consider faults in order to keep the spotlight on him – and this can be incredibly painful if he chooses to do this heinous act IN FRONT of other people like your friends, his friends, and even in front of your family. It’s almost like if an extrovert was dating an introvert, but only the relationship is lined with some pretty heavy dysfunction. A man should highlight your insecurities just so he can have his moment in the sun. It’s just plain wrong.

13Keeps You At His Beck-And-Call

When you’re an insecure woman in a relationship, sometimes you let your fears get the better of you and you start to constantly fear that he’s going to leave you if he begins to notice those very insecurities. So what do you do? YOU overcompensate by doing everything in your power to make sure he’s happy and satisfied in the relationship. Meaning – you do every single thing he asks. You’re constantly at his beck-and-call and he enjoys the utter heck out of it. If he figures out you’re doing this because of your insecurities, he may feed off of it in order to keep the streak going. I mean, why wouldn’t he? He’s getting everything he’s wanting right now because of your own fears of losing him. But if he’s this type of guy, it’s most likely better to drop him and drop him fast.

12Figures You Would Never Cheat

Ah yes, THIS type of guy: the guy who was cheated on so hard in the past that he’s attempting to find some kind of douchey loophole that will keep you from cheating on him, and that includes highlighting your insecurities. He does this because he believes if you think this low of yourself, that you wouldn’t be attracted to someone else since you believe no one else would look at you that way. It’s this type of man who ends up alone because his plan always backfires. A strong woman will see this right off the bat and leave his butt in the gutter OR the dummy boyfriend will just end up driving her into the arms of someone else, thus continuing the vicious circle of cheating. It’s sad but true.

11Makes You Vulnerable

This tends to happen with women who don’t show vulnerability very much – they’re so guarded and afraid to get hurt, so they just don’t let anyone get too close to them. However, when a guy happens to slip past the barriers with some nefarious outlook, he’ll feed off these insecurities in order to make the strong woman more vulnerable. For some reason, jerk weasels tend to enjoy it when a strong, successful woman is vulnerable because it’s such a rare instance. And when she’s feeling vulnerable, she tends to lean more so on his shoulder and be a little bit more passive than usual. Jerks tend to feed off this passiveness and mistaken it for weakness, which is a bad move on their part because a strong woman will retaliate in a vicious way if she finds out what’s being done.

10Makes Him Feel Like A Knight-In-Shining-Armor

We were lead to believe that it was always the princess who needed saving when we were little kids: whether it was from an evil, apple welding witch with a giant wart on her nose, or some demonic wizard in a dark castle, the prince or white knight would swoop in and rescue the damsel in distress. Yes, these were the Disney illusions that were put upon us while growing up. Thankfully, fairytales have gotten their act together and feature more and more women who don’t need the hand of a man to get out of a sticky situation. Yet, there are still men who have this bizarre “Knight-in-shining-armor” complex, the ones who need to be the hero. Someone like this, if he’s a not-so-decent guy, will play off your insecurities in order to “rescue” you so he can feel manlier. He'll insult you just to compliment you seconds later. That's not knight-material there, dude - you're just playing Scar from The Lion King.

9More Dramatic Bedroom Play

Ugh, there’s no way to tip-toe around this paragraph. Yes, some foolish men will play your insecurities like an air guitar if he believes it will allow him to be more selfish in the bedroom. It’s a common misconception that insecure women tend to be more open to anything in regards to bedroom play because she’s willing to do anything to mask these particular insecurities. Men believe they can be as selfish as they want in this department because an insecure woman should be “grateful” that he’s being intimate with her at all. WHAT THE UTTER HECK, OH NO THIS IS NOT OKAY. It’s not even okay for men to THINK this. If you do happen to be this type of woman, a devious man will keep up with your insecurities in order to get what he wants in this department. Freaking sad.

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8You’re Constantly Validating Him

Why is it when a woman feels insecure, especially a strong one, she isn’t the one who needs constant validation? Is it the idiot man she’s in a relationship with? If you’re insecure, you find yourself constantly reassuring HIM and flattering him at every single turn. Why is that? Because you’re trying to keep him happy out of fear, and it does wonders for his own self-esteem and security, but only brings you down and can make you feel more insecure, especially if the validation isn’t mutual. If you find yourself constantly feeding him compliments and reassuring him that you love him while keeps mum on his end, you need to run and run as fast as you can in the opposite direction. It only seems to expand his ever growing ego.

7Makes His Flirting With Other Women Okay

This goes back to the constant fear that a man will walk away if he realizes your insecurities, so you let him get away with blatantly obvious stuff like, oh, I dunno, FLIRTING with other women. A man (or rather, a pig) will flirt with other women while in your presence if he feels he can get away with it. It boosts his ego in more ways than one: for one, here is this girl who he’s getting his flirt on with who is paying attention to him while he gets his jollies by making you feel bad about yourself in the process. He KNOWS you won’t do anything about it or attempt to stop him or even stage a dramatic scene. It’s like he’s able to have his cake and eat it too.

6You’re Kept In The Dark About His Side Habits

If a guy is treating you this poorly by keeping you insecure, chance are he’s doing other bad things that you have no idea about. Could he be cheating? You don’t really know because he constantly keeps you in the dark about what’s going on in his life. Perhaps he’s trying to make himself appear more mysterious if he does this? If it is, it’s just something that he seems he thinks he can get away with if he’s with an insecure woman. But yet, if SHE attempts to do the same thing, he’ll call her out right away and attempt to put her back in “check”. And if she’s really insecure, she’ll fall back in line. I’m pretty sure this is why serial killers usually pick insecure women to marry in order to lead double lives.

5No Questions

This one goes hand and hand with the “being kept in the dark” paragraph. An insecure woman is most likely to be more afraid of asking questions to the man she’s in a relationship with, out of fear of being a nag, so she just becomes passive. A man who is a dingbat will be thrilled that you don’t feel the need to ask him “where are you going?” when he goes out at night, while a normal, decent human being will wonder why you aren’t more inquisitive. A secure man won’t put up with the no questions thing and attempt to get you to open up more while an insecure one enjoys that you can be walked all over with any sort of consequence. It’s a classic case of reflecting AND projecting.

4He’s Able To Control The Entire Relationship

In a healthy relationship, the two people involved are about to share control with no one really playing the “dominant” role. It’s a mutual between the two and who “controls” doesn’t really play a factor because you both are comfortable in your own skins. However, a man who enjoys it better when his partner is insecure will feel smug because he’s able to be the dominant one who is taking control of the relationship. Sometimes he’ll even take control of YOU and start bossing you around in order to make him feel more like a “man” which is ridiculous and sometimes can turn dangerous. If you happen to be in a relationship with someone like this, it’s best to keep your eyes open at all times and pay close attention to his controlling nature. Better yet, just get the heck out of dodge.

3He Enjoys Reassuring You

Here’s another guy who is on the opposite end of the entire “controlling” thing, and while this may seem harmless, it’s really not. He stands neck-and-neck with the guy who just wants to play the part of the White Knight – he enjoys tearing you down a little in order to build you back up. He LIKES reassuring you that everything will be alright, but if he’s not reassuring you in a proper manner (like actually having an open and honest discussion about your insecurities and your feelings and thoughts on the matter), only covering it up with “there, there’s”, you got someone on your hands who just likes the comforting part of the insecure web. And it’s all-the-more worse if he’s actually not really being reassuring but rather sarcastic about it too.

2He Likes Winning Your Arguments

Ah yes, the man who believes he’s never wrong. The one who would drive someone who is pretty secure about themselves up a wall because he’s constantly picking fights just to see if he can somehow win them. It’s irritating to someone who doesn’t suffer from that many insecurities. But to someone who does? She just lets it happen and instead of arguing back, she submits, which only feeds his pompous, ever-growing ego. A man with a normal sized ego won’t do this to a woman and won’t want to win an argument against someone who is only shutting down out of fear of abandonment. That’s called being a decent human being and decent man. Usually, this type of man can’t handle being in a relationship with a strong woman because she won’t stand down, so therefore he moves on to what he considers to be a weaker target.

1He’s Just A Jerk-Wad

Let’s just face it: a man who does any of these things in order to keep you insecure is just a freaking jag-weasel who deserves to be kicked in the crotch by the women from A Handmaid’s Tale. Real men don’t put women through doubting herself and/or hating herself in order to keep her around. A real, good man will build her up and turn her insecurities into happiness. A decent boyfriend will make an insecure woman stronger and make her feel good about herself. The only reason a man likes a woman he's seeing to be insecure is because he’s living in the Stone Age and has a cavemen likeness. It makes THEM feel more powerful when they’re simply just insecure little boys themselves who shouldn’t even be in a relationship. Period.